by Katee Robert
Queen Takes Rose
A Wicked Villains Novel
Katee Robert
Trinkets and Tales LLC
Copyright © 2020 by Katee Robert
All rights reserved.
Cover art by By Hang Le
Editing by Manuela Velasco
Copy Editing by Lynda M. Ryba
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-951329-03-7
Print ISBN: 978-1-951329-07-5
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Also by Katee Robert
Wicked Villains
Book 1: Desperate Measures
Book 2: Learn My Lesson
Book 3: A Worthy Opponent
Book 4: The Beast
Book 5: The Sea Witch
Book 6: Queen Takes Rose
A Touch of Taboo
Book 1: Your Dad Will Do
Book 2: Gifting Me To His Best Friend
The Island of Ys
Book 1: His Forbidden Desire
Book 2: Her Rival’s Touch
Book 3: His Tormented Heart
Book 4: Her Vengeful Embrace
The Thalanian Dynasty Series (MMF)
Book 1: Theirs for the Night
Book 2: Forever Theirs
Book 3: Theirs Ever After
Book 4: Their Second Chance
The Kings Series
Book 1: The Last King
Book 2: The Fearless King
The Hidden Sins Series
Book 1: The Devil’s Daughter
Book 2: The Hunting Grounds
Book 3: The Surviving Girls
The Make Me Series
Book 1: Make Me Want
Book 2: Make Me Crave
Book 3: Make Me Yours
Book 4: Make Me Need
The O’Malley Series
Book 1: The Marriage Contract
Book 2: The Wedding Pact
Book 3: An Indecent Proposal
Book 4: Forbidden Promises
Book 5: Undercover Attraction
Book 6: The Bastard’s Bargain
The Hot in Hollywood Series
Book 1: Ties that Bind
Book 2: Animal Attraction
The Foolproof Love Series
Book 1: A Foolproof Love
Book 2: Fool Me Once
Book 3: A Fool for You
Out of Uniform Series
Book 1: In Bed with Mr. Wrong
Book 1.5: His to Keep
Book 2: Falling for His Best Friend
Book 3: His Lover to Protect
Book 3.5: His to Take
Serve Series
Book 1: Mistaken by Fate
Book 2: Betting on Fate
Book 3: Protecting Fate
Come Undone Series
Book 1: Wrong Bed, Right Guy
Book 2: Chasing Mrs. Right
Book 3: Two Wrongs, One Right
Book 3.5: Seducing Mr. Right
Other Books
Seducing the Bridesmaid
Meeting His Match
Prom Queen
The Siren’s Curse
Contents
Content Warning
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Content Warning
This book contains depiction of the death of a comatose parent (mother). This may be triggering for some readers.
1
Aurora
Everyone talks about hope like it’s a silver bullet. As if it’s enough to keep a person putting one foot in front of the other even in the most impossible situations. As if hope alone can see a person through anything.
Once upon a time, I even believed it.
Back when I was young and foolish and, even though the world had kicked me in the teeth time and time again, I somehow kept the stars in my eyes. I was so sure that if I could just believe hard enough, that if I could hold on to hope, one day my mother would wake up.
I didn’t realize that hope could sour, could slowly go dark and begin to poison every bit of me. I couldn’t have known that I’d learn to hate through virtue of that faltering light.
The woman in the hospital bed is my mother, but she might as well be a stranger. Even before a fight for dominance put her in a coma, she was more fantasy than reality to me. Nothing more than a promise of a relationship later, when I was older, when I could handle myself without being a liability. I just had to be a good girl and obey my grandmother and eventually my mother would send for me.
Another hope, dashed to pieces at my feet.
Twenty years later, and it’s finally time to admit that she’s never waking up. It’s time to make the decision I’ve put off for far too long. It’s time to finally let her go.
“Aurora.”
I suck in a breath and turn to Allecto. She’s the only other person who knows everything there is to know about my bargain with Hades, knows all the dirty little details of how I got to this place. Of who’s to blame. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re really not.” She states it as fact, without a bit of pity. I appreciate that bluntness. Allecto won’t coddle me or tell me pretty lies. It’s one of the reasons she’s my best friend. “You don’t have to do this now.”
“Yes, I do. I only have two weeks left in my contract with Hades. If she hasn’t woken up now, she’s not going to.” I almost sound like I accept it as truth. As if I didn’t spend the entire night pacing my apartment and debating whether this is really the right call. But that’s cowardice talking. Facts are facts, and the fact is that if my mother were going to wake up, she would have done it years and years ago.
Allecto huffs out a breath and crosses her impressive arms over her chest. She’s wearing her normal street clothes outfit of jeans and a pale-gray T-shirt that sets off her dark-brown skin, and she’s got her long, black braids fastened back from her face. “You know as well as I do that Hades will continue to pay this bill as long as you ask him to. He’s not going to cut her off, not after all this time.”
She’s likely right, but I can’t ask him to do that. I won’t. “It’s time.”
She opens her mouth like she’s going to keep arguing but finally gives a sharp nod. “Do you want me to get the doctor?”
“Yes, please.” No reason to wait. No reason to give myself time to lose my nerve.
I wait for her to leave and turn back to the hospital bed. The machines that breathe for my mother make soft sounds that grind against my nerves. I’ve always hated ho
spitals, and this long-term care facility might pretty itself up, but it’s a hospital where people go to die. Today, my mother joins their number.
Truth be told, she died within a week of the injury that put her in a coma. At least according to the doctors.
My grandmother used to always tell me how much I reminded her of my mom. We have the same light-brown skin and delicate features, but it’s hard to see the similarities right now. She looks like a shadow of the woman she used to be. A ghost still retaining flesh, whose spirit has long since fled.
I close my eyes and try to breathe past the burning in my throat. “I’m sorry, Mom. I’m sorry that I’m giving up.” I take a ragged inhale. “I can’t fix what happened, but I’ll make sure she pays.”
She. Malone.
The woman whose bid for power took everything from me.
The door opens, and I wipe hastily at my eyes. Neither the doctor nor Allecto comment on it. Dr. Volsce has been in this facility nearly as long as my mother has. He takes my hands, expression carefully neutral but somehow sympathetic at the same time. “Are you ready?”
No. I’ll never be ready.
“Yes.”
He doesn’t ask me if I’m sure, for which I’m grateful. He simply gives my hands a squeeze and nods. “Okay.”
Things move quickly after that. Two nurses appear and begin fiddling with the machines. Allecto and I end up near the foot of the bed, and she throws an arm around my shoulders, holding me tightly as, one by one, the machines go silent.
The seconds tick by, filled with the roaring in my head. It’s over. It’s truly, finally, over. I hate that there’s an element of relief, hate that I’ve been grieving this woman for two-thirds of my life but somehow there’s still plenty left in the well. I’m shaking, but Allecto holds me steady. She doesn’t offer meaningless kind words or even look at me. She simply stands as a rock at my side, providing me with the strength I don’t have right now.
I feel like I blink and we’re in the car, heading back to the Underworld. “There are arrangements—”
“We’ll take care of it.” She glances at me. “Give yourself the day. Hell, give yourself the week, the month. As long as you need.”
If only it were that easy. My emotions are a tangled mess inside me, grief and anger and loss and helplessness. For so long, the shining star I’ve held aloft is hope that my mother would one day come back to me, that she’d open her eyes and we could finally be a family. A silly, childish dream.
My dreams for the future never extended beyond that point.
I lean back against the seat and watch the city blocks cruise by. I was born in Carver City, and I’ve lived here the entire time. First with my grandmother, then I moved into the Underworld and beneath Hades’s wing at twenty-one. I’ve never traveled, barely moved beyond the center of the city that compromises Hades’s territory. It’s never felt claustrophobic before, but now I can’t quite draw a full breath. “I have to get out of here.”
“Are you about to be sick in my car?”
I close my eyes. “No.”
Allecto is silent for a long moment. “You mean get out of the city.”
“Yes.”
“It might be good for you.”
That surprises me enough that I look at her. “What?”
She shrugs. “I know you’ve been happy here, but fuck, Aurora, you’re thirty. Even with Hades taking his percentage of your income in repayment, you have more than enough money to travel the world for a decade or two without worrying about finances. Why not do it?”
She’s right. I like my indulgences—pretty clothes and the best beauty supplies money can buy—but even with those expenses, I have a rather large savings account. Nearly ten years working as the premier submissive in the Underworld will do that for a person.
I tentatively consider the thought of traveling. It’s not unappealing, though my stomach twists nervously at the thought of being alone. Truly alone in a way I never have in life up to this point. There was always someone there. My grandmother. Then my found family in the Underworld: Allecto and Meg and Hercules and even Hades. My patrons, Gaeton and Hook and Ursa. Even a few boyfriends and girlfriends over the years, though those relationships didn’t last. “I’ll think about it.”
“Think fast. You have two weeks left in your contract.” She pulls into the parking garage beneath the Underworld and nods at the white guy manning the booth. He’s new enough that I haven’t memorized his name, but the intense way he looks at us says that he’s serious about his job. Good. After what happened with Tink’s personal items not too long ago, Hades has upped security throughout the building to ensure no one gets in that he doesn’t want there.
It’s not until Allecto’s parked and we’ve climbed out of the car that I really stop and think about what the deadline means. “Do you think he’s going to kick me out?”
She laughs. “Fuck no.”
“He kicked Tink out.” I follow her into the elevator and lean against the wall. “There’s no reason he won’t do the same to me.”
“I can think of several.” She rolls her eyes. “One: Tink might have been damn good at her job, but she didn’t really love working here. She was using it to hide. Two: not only do you genuinely love your job, but you bring in a truly absurd amount of money. He’ll keep you on as long as you want to be here, trust me.” She slants me a look. “Three: Hades has a soft spot for you.”
“He does not.”
“You know better.” Allecto snorts. “I’m not going to say he sees you as a daughter, because that’d be weird as shit, but he’s protective of you in a way that he isn’t of most people who work here. Just trust me on this.”
I want to, but my ability to be optimistic died with my decision to pull the plug on my mother. There’s nothing left but a strange, dark sensation in my chest. I should feel more, shouldn’t I? I should be crying and wailing and unable to function.
Instead, all I feel is empty.
The elevator doors open on the floor that houses the private residences of people who live here. There aren’t many these days. Me, Allecto, Tisiphone. Technically Hercules and Meg have their own rooms, but they’re rarely used since they spend most of their nights with Hades.
I start toward my room, but Hercules appears at the end of the hall, looking harried. “There you are.”
“Here I am.” My voice sounds decidedly normal, which is a small revelation. At least the vines full of thorns embedded in my chest are invisible to anyone else.
“Hades would like to see you.”
I take a step forward before Allecto catches my shoulder. “The old man can wait. Give yourself a little time to catch your breath.”
She’s probably right, but I’m not in the mood to wait. No matter what Hades has to say, it will offer a distraction from the memory of the silent hospital room we just left. “It’s fine.” I inject some sunshine into my tone because Hercules looks worried. “I’ll go see him now.”
The elevator is the closest way up, but I don’t trust Allecto not to follow me into it and then demand to be present for whatever Hades has to say. She doesn’t normally meddle in Underworld affairs unless it’s directly related to security, but one look at her face shows a worry she can’t quite hide. “I’m fine.”
“The more you say that, the less I believe you.”
Hercules looks between us. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” I slip past Hercules before Allecto can keep arguing. She curses but doesn’t try to chase me down, probably because she knows Hercules will demand answers until someone tells him what’s happening. Explaining what I’ve done today means explaining how I’ve had a mother in a coma for two decades, which means explaining the terms of my bargain.
I know Hercules. He won’t understand.
I take the stairs up to the floor that houses the main club and Hades’s public office, and then I pause on the landing for several long minutes while I put my armor back in place. Soft spot
or no, it doesn’t do to meet with Hades while bleeding from an emotional wound. He won’t be able to help himself. He’ll poke at it until I spill all my messy emotions all over both of us.
When I’m reasonably sure that I can walk into the office without breaking down, I leave the stairwell. The hall is empty, which is a small blessing, and I stride to Hades’s office and let myself in.
A quick glance around the room shows that it’s the exact same as it’s always been. Hades has a private office, but this is the space where he prefers to handle any club business that arises. The room is done in shades of gray, and careful lighting always leaves the man behind the desk bathed in shadow. It’s very dramatic, but I’d never be fool enough to say as much to Hades.
He’s the only one in the room.
I clear my throat, fighting down a flutter of nerves. “You called for me?”
“Sit.”
As I make the short trip across the office to sink into a chair across from him, the empty feeling in my chest yawns wider. I clasp my hands in my lap tightly enough to grind my bones together and try to keep my voice even. Hades doesn’t immediately speak, which only heightens the sudden concern that I’m right and Allecto is full of shit. “Are you going to kick me out the same way you kicked out Tink?”
Even with the shadows, I can see Hades’s surprise. “You and Tink are hardly the same, Aurora.”
A sentiment I’ve heard more times than I can count, especially since I took over her position. If Tink weren’t one of my closest friends, it might make me hate her. As it is, she gave me large shoes to fill when she left. I try to still my sudden shaking. “With respect, that’s not an answer.”
